Gaias 1.2 ... and yes, I'm not joking.

[teh.fellow]

Well yes, this is a remainder of the last work on the map we made.

Let's see what we can do for the next version ... but remember this will take minimum 3-4 months.

 

[Ski_pie]

Happy to see that the game is being worked on. I have no comments on the way that you are working on this, but i would like to ask how big is the team that is working on this game? Just so that i can understand the complexity of map making and updating.

 

[ChaosClouds]

the most contributor to this map is zweibelchen i believe
idk currently who are working for this project for now.
maybe teh.fellow will help zweibelchen

 

[S0ulseeker]

Well yes, this is a remainder of the last work on the map we made.

Let's see what we can do for the next version ... but remember this will take minimum 3-4 months.

Take all the time you guys need, you can't rush perfection and I know how hard you guys are working on it :]

Happy to see that the game is being worked on. I have no comments on the way that you are working on this, but i would like to ask how big is the team that is working on this game? Just so that i can understand the complexity of map making and updating.

The team used to consist of four people, Zwieb, teh.fellow, Muzzel, and Shappy. Of course Zwieb and teh.fellow were the lead workers on the program. I believe now it is just zwieb and teh.fellow. Can't deny they make a good team though :]

 

[Ski_pie]

I don't know if this has been decided yet, but I think you should do a code reset. Many players have benefited from hacked maps and have used them to unfairly increase their levels and to gain high end items illegitimately.

I also remember seeing another topic where someone was offering to add in anti hack protection for Gaia's. I think that this would be a great improvement and should be implemented in the futrue so that Gaia's could be more fair.

P.S. I have no map making experience, I'm just contributing some ideas that I think would help improve Gaia's.

 

[Kniff]

That doesnt matter as Zwiebel wont fix the NPC abuse of Gaspode. Its propably to difficult to fix that

 

[Ski_pie]

Still going to play!

So then the codes will not be reset then. Oh well still going to be fun anyway.

 

[Zwiebelchen]

That doesnt matter as Zwiebel wont fix the NPC abuse of Gaspode. Its propably to difficult to fix that

It's not like it is hard to fix ... I could always add in some weird workaround. It's just that I really don't want to fix the bugs that are caused by blizzard's screwups in game coding. Maybe they will fix the control bug of neutrals somewhen. :/

About the current progress: aw, this could really take longer than I ever expected ... I am SO rusted in terms of vJASS coding ... I even got difficulties writing simple spells. I always thought this was like bycycling - once learned, you will never forget - but its totally not like that. -_-'
Also, I got some problems not related to coding at all ... like my newgen being heavily damaged by anti-virus software in the last months and the editor getting extremely slow because of all the goddamn object data and objects in the map already.


And goddamn, I'm seriously pissed when I think about the time I invested in all the modeling stuff ...
You know, the institute I'm studiing at at the university happens to have a body scanner and high-resolution human models. :/ ... I wish I would have known that more early. Now its too late to change the models again, as it would be way to much of work.

 

[Aegir]

Hi everyone, especially map creators. And big thanks to Zwiebelhen for ressurecting this project. You created astounding and wonderfull map, maybe one of the top 10 in W3 and probably the best for me. And by that genius act you also created a lot of precious memories for fans. It's pity that Gaia was not finished. But now you gave us all new hopes.
Personally I have been playing Gaia since autumn 2009 with few breakes. But generally I'm great fan of Gaias Retaliation so I thought that I should said something in discussion and ensured you of our ... support. And to share my thoughts with you.
First of all i have to endorse most of things that SmileyGhost said. There are some differenties in our detailed opinions but cardinal thesis are the same.
So my ideas are as follow:

1.There are few unused traders at Mytargas Trade District. You should do something with them because they look somewhat ... ekhem... mysterious?

2.I have to confirm what Kris said about Fatal Error, that is induced by 2 synchronised actions of skeleton mages, probably casting two thunderbolts at the same time. Error usually, if not always, appears in D3 when engaging in battle with 2 groups of undeads below Firelord location. Error is not caused by fight with single group of undeads in that location.

3.I would advice adding few monsters, let's say sludges of 2-3 types, in the Mytargas sewers just like Soulkeeper said. Sewers in RPG always are filled with monsters . Also the location after the bridge at north from road to Mytargas might be inhabited by some creatures or NPC (maybe Hermit with guest, e.g. who has a solve to Mytargas fungi problem). Near to that bridge is dead forest that also may be a good location for some improvements (just few creatures, maybe undeads/shadows, are sufficient).

4.Ring of Shadows has been often droping from robbing Sanev in earlier versions. I have been playing in version 1.1e many hours and haven't found it, haven't even seen it. Maybe it's some problem with map settings. Or just bad luck.

5.The main problem of version 1.1e in my opinion is rangers pet. In my humble opinion rangers pet at lvl 40 is unacceptable. At least his outlook . For those that haven't seen it yet, it's boar, the same like that 11 lvl boars from hunting quest. It has to be some kind of mistake or maybe joke. But it's just imho. If i were you, i would switch him for larger wolf or ... grizzly, tiger, whatever, but not boar.

6.Spelltrap? Consider other names like Counterspell, Reflection or Spell Shield.

7.Necromancer Sacrifice spell might cause an explosion hurting all targets in small radius, even allies, in addition to mana recharge because necromancers minion shouldn't be only walking mana potion that can take few hits. It may be a bit unlogic but skeletons need a boost, that is a fact. And sacrifice spell which gives only mana looks weak. And it is weak. Just like necromancer at all now. Necromancer doesn't need a mana, he needs power.

8.Assasin need's a new trap imho. For me it should be time bomb with, e.g. 5s casting in stealth mode and 3s counting for squad regrouping because of massive explosion threat. You should also consider "coup de grace", skill that could do a huge damage on sleeping/stunned/etc. target.

9.For Bishop I would advice an exorcism. It means spell that works on one target and do a small amount of divine damage/healing and efect of stun+slow/cure and repel of all curses, poisons or other negative effects depending on target type.

10.About Berserker now... You may give him battle shout, aura, some kind of enchant like berserker's fury that works similar to illidan's immolation. Maybe some passives - add to weapon or to hp&armor. Also Shockwave or War Stamp are interesting. Your conception, your choose. For me similarities of Berserker and Crusader in tanking aspects are fine but it's true that in new version they should differentiate in applications.

11.PvP is not crucial in Gaia but idea of utilizing Arena in PvP for gold may be good. I would think about experience or other bounty for winner. Now there's no use for huge amounts of gold at high lvls. You can only accumulate thousands.

12.Because you have small amount of time, staff and resources my advice is that in most changes that consist upgrades of features contained in 1.1e you should base on things that you have created so far. E.g. adding new monsters in existing locations like sewers or expand of terrain at east from Mythargas imho might be done only by using ready to use resources. Then you might focus on additions to 1.1e.

And that's all i think. For now . So all that left to wish you good luck with ending that project. Gaia has a lot of fans, most of them had never entered this forum but they exist somewhere, trust me. Not as much as other maps because noobs doesn't understand Gaia and leave quicker than join. But those who remain transforms into Gaia Fanatic that is no cure for that. And all those maniacal fans count on you. Their... Our hopes too.

PS: D3 needs only a team of 3 professional players with reasonable equipment and average lvl 36 (min.32) that contain tank (crusader/berserker), healer (!!!BISHOP!!!) and proDPS (Mage/Berserker or maybe Hunter/Assasin). But Bosses are hard indeed. Firelord in addition of good micro needs also special gear set for all team members. But a key to all Gaia problems is good tactics combined with good micro.

 

[Zwiebelchen]

I like some of the spell ideas you proposed - especially the coup de grace idea. It's actually pretty easy to make, as all stunning in the map is triggered anyways, to allow the stun immunity of bosses. I also like the explosion of sleketons by using sacrifice. Nice add to utility.
Keep good ideas like this coming pls.

 

[AnektoD]

Hi, nice to see you again. I want to ask a question, when you see the new version of the game?
-And please delete Gaias unprotector map topic please.
-All can make hack save codes.

 

[Aegir]

This is not that I invented all that things. We may say that already all have been invented and the key is to combine right motives correctly in something interesting. And i think that Gaia do that well. Peronally Gaias Retaliation remembers me Baldurs Gate. The same imressions when playing. Ok, it puts less emphasize on story, but overrall impresion is the similar.

The motive of exploding corpses was used in Diablo III at one of Witchdoctor skills. But I invented it independently when considering synthesis of Necro's Revive and Corpse explosion. There is only one question - what exactly in skeleton explodes? Bones? Skull?... But that's not a big problem... magic... magic.

Main topic when discusing a new skills should be a difficulty level of implementation. I suppose you have not much time while studying what I understand well . You even said that. So new ideas should be as simple as it can and contain only basic conception that you can develope in any way you want. Second thing is that you should not hesitate when using original Warcraft 3 resources when it fullfil your vision.

I will mention two skills here that are greatly underrated by many players. Personally I apreciate those "basic" skills as one of most usefull for user classes even in advanced level fights (as D3 waves and inside Port).
First spell that I want to mention is Ranger's Net. Simple and amazing spell... Extremely usefull and underestimated. Lots to be said, it's very good spell even in fighting Andy. Can be used by Hunter and Druid as well. It shows that druid is not weaker comparing with Hunter... Druid has only other functions. It's a dps/supporter/healer hybrid as was been said before. Even now she is a good choice as 4th or 5th team member in D3, especially for followers of her style. And she needs only one or two usefull apllication to be more atractive. Not everyone has to pwn. Gaia had to be a team orpg. TEAM ORPG. The problem here is a little elite character of that map, but thats good point imo, because gaia always was hard and should be hard even if my team because of our age has lack of reflexe to kill Firelord and problems with sucubus.
Second good skill is Thiefs Dazing Trap. Amazing spell that is very usefull in example on D3 waves. Assasin has to dps... But what about bard who as a supporter has more time for special operations. I want to remind that sleepbomb can be used !!! in fight !!!... If you had been hidden before of course. By the way, let's try to combine that with new spell of Assasins that allows to hide in battle if that hiding removes you from battle. Do you know what i'm trying to say? Nevermind. Ability to eliminate part of enemy group is really usefull. In extreme case we are fighting with only one of them. Inconspicuous skill, serious usefulness.

At the end I want to suggest somethink for monk. Keywords: Wrestling, Grappling, Melee fighting, jujutsu, something that keeps attention of one enemy for a little time... even enabling finishing him off by assasin with coup the grace. We can sey one-enemy-tanking-skill. It's colliding with evasion but all has cost.

 

[AnektoD]

And i found two bug;
-If dungeon 3 start, we get a delay.We cant kill skeletons, im bishop i cant use heal.
-And look photo, i tested dungeon3 single player, if i go here dungeon reset pls fix it.
This photo;

 

[noob1011990]

if i play new version map, my saved codes of 1.1e can be used ?

 

[Aegir]

When I'm reading two last posts i think it should be code wipe...at least as a punishment.

 

[SmileyGhost]

if i play new version map, my saved codes of 1.1e can be used ?

Read:

For all those worried about possible future code wipes: At the current state, it will be unlikely. There are still enough "slots" for 2 new spells and a lot of new items left in the current code. Also I still have some quest slots left, so I don't think there will be a codewipe. However, I can not guarantee it by 100%. Just like ... 95% or so.

And i found two bug;
-If dungeon 3 start, we get a delay.We cant kill skeletons, im bishop i cant use heal.
-And look photo, i tested dungeon3 single player, if i go here dungeon reset pls fix it.
This photo;

I've never heard of the first "bug" you mentioned, are you sure that the problem isn't with you?
As for the second one, Soulseeker already mentioned it here:

If everyone in the party steps in this spot in D3 the dungeon resets. I think it counts as 'being out of the dungeon' the same as if people would all leave the dungeon and have it reset. I did it in single player right now with a cheat code enabled to show you the spot, but I've done it in a multiplayer game as well.

http://imageshack.us/f/32/resetbug.png/

As for the:

When I'm reading two last posts i think it should be code wipe...at least as a punishment.

Uh... What?

 

[Aegir]

It's only the feeling that some may need it as a cold shower. Don't you feel a little confused and uneasy when you see the content of 2 last posts? I know, it was exageration, heavy joke in fact. But code wipe is good and bad idea at the same time. Everyone know why it's bad. But not everyone know why it's good, beside of eliminating hacks, the result of existing unprotected map and smart guys who put a little effort to exploiting protected map.

I have lasted 3 or more code wipes since i started playing Gaia. Each time i restarted creating the same classed that i had, and even new classes that i hadn't tested yet. I believe that true fan of Gaia doesn't worry about code wipes. He simply start once more. But i have to mention, that each time that i begun playing Gaia from start i were learning something new about map, tactics, classes, spell usefulness etc. And each time it was good chance to recruit new guys to Gaia community. Some of them changed into devoted fans. So i don't think that code wipe is necessarily something bad.

I prefere the codes are preserved in new version, but i don't really care if they will be wiped.

And it may be good punishemnt for some dodgers, as I said ;P

But in the subject.
1.Delay in what? Which skeletons and where exactly you can't kill? When Bishop cannot heal?
2.I've heard about reseting D3 at spot shown by AnektoD, but every time when someone were showing it to me it didn't work. No one tried to do it at place shown by Soulseeker though.
3.So many cheats on screen. Ah my eyes... It's goog that this is on SP. ;P
4.Problem of code wiping in 1.2 was explained by Zwiebelchen in this topic. Few times.

And sry for confusion about my sarcastic joke.

 

[AnektoD]

1.Delay in what? Which skeletons and where exactly you can't kill? When Bishop cannot heal?

Delay= not internet lag, its game lag(hard control).

 

[Aegir]

Ah, now i know what you mean. On computers with weak hardware configuration sometimes gameplay or graphic is... "shaking". You call it lags, but it's caused by low fps at that moment. Not enough ram on board or graphic card or too slow cpu/gpu. You should try with lower settings. Set all graph and game settings to minimum, even set off sound 3d. And it should be better. At least set off whatever you can when you fight in D3.

 

[Kl3sk]

Ah, now i know what you mean. On computers with weak hardware configuration sometimes gameplay or graphic is... "shaking". You call it lags, but it's caused by low fps at that moment. Not enough ram on board or graphic card or too slow cpu/gpu. You should try with lower settings. Set all graph and game settings to minimum, even set off sound 3d. And it should be better. At least set off whatever you can when you fight in D3.

How can he do that when the map requires having graphs maxed out to work ? The game insta-crashes otherwise.

 

[Miss_Foxy]

Glad to see you back working on it, but what do you mean by that sharing thingy and orange items?

 

[Aegir]

How can he do that when the map requires having graphs maxed out to work ? The game insta-crashes otherwise.

Main menu is different from in-game menu. Main menu settings have few more options that you cannot set off in game e.g. display resolution, model and texture quality. In my computer, which handle with Half Life 2 and F.E.A.R 2 on max and almost max settings very well, Dungeon 3 sometimes "lags" at waves, for examples when i use crucify and mage cast his spells. But when i toggle off shadows, oclusion, EAX and set as low particle system and lights the animations are smooth.

Zwiebelchen advice to max all graphic settings in Gaia and he has right. Without it Gaia may not work correctly or even not load and doesn't look so astounding. But when animation is jumping you have no choice.

Personally I don't have that problem and I usually play with everything maxed out. But first time on D3 waves 2-7 may need it in most cases.

I recommend to set in main menu at least models and textures quality to high and after map load everything in graphic and sound to low or off.

But this is out of discussion topic which is Gaia Retaliation 1.2.

 

[Zwiebelchen]

Awww, dudes, seriously, what are the machines running wc3 for you? Seriously, WC3 runs with like 50 fps on 10 year old computers even for gaias ... Why the heck should anyone have graphical problems with this game?!

I know Gaias is sometimes "lagging" a little, but that is due to some heavy flaws in the game-engine and can usually not be avoided by turning down the graphics. It simply happens because the map is too big and has to much doodads and script code.


Some more thoughts about the upcoming skills for those undecided yet classes:

Berserker will probably get a passive spell and another single-target dps skill. I simple felt the berserker would get a little bit overpowered by giving it another AoE type spell ... i dont want to have mage archetypes become obsolete and I definitely don't want berserkers to be full-fledged tanks.
For the assassin, I really like the coup de grace spell. As far as the synergy of "Into the shades" with dazing trap goes ... I think I will increase the cooldown of into the shades and to compensate for it, make it a permanent aggro wipe.

As far as sorcerer goes; I plan to replace lightning strike by the meteor spell I had planned and remove the stun component. I simply think that both spells will become to similar in use, so I got rid of that idea. Instead, I will give the sorcerer a lightning-element spamable spell, to allow more element-diversity in the game. The lightning spell will probably come with some handy side effect that allows a little bit of combination, like dealing more damage on frost caged enemies or enemies that recently got hit by water globes.


For those who can't wait for the new version coming out ... please be a little patient. This is really much harder than I expected. I am so rusted in terms of jassing that I haven't even actually started working on the spell code yet. I'm still just reading all my script again and trying to understand what I did there once, to avoid unpleasant bugs.
*sigh* ... I just hope I can "relearn" all the stuff soon.


About those requesting a code wipe:
I won't do that as long as it is not required.

 

[Adiktuz]

well, on my old comp which was about 5 years old, Gaias was lagging really bad... haha... but on the other comp it works totally fast...

 

[SmileyGhost]

Some more thoughts about the upcoming skills for those undecided yet classes:

Berserker will probably get a passive spell and another single-target dps skill. I simple felt the berserker would get a little bit overpowered by giving it another AoE type spell ... i dont want to have mage archetypes become obsolete and I definitely don't want berserkers to be full-fledged tanks.
For the assassin, I really like the coup de grace spell. As far as the synergy of "Into the shades" with dazing trap goes ... I think I will increase the cooldown of into the shades and to compensate for it, make it a permanent aggro wipe.

Sounds great! I'm guessing the coup de grace won't be as powerful as the Bladefury hitting from behind in stealth? Otherwise it would reduce the Bladefury's significance quite a bit.

As far as sorcerer goes; I plan to replace lightning strike by the meteor spell I had planned and remove the stun component. I simply think that both spells will become to similar in use, so I got rid of that idea. Instead, I will give the sorcerer a lightning-element spamable spell, to allow more element-diversity in the game. The lightning spell will probably come with some handy side effect that allows a little bit of combination, like dealing more damage on frost caged enemies or enemies that recently got hit by water globes.

I like these ideas a lot. I have questions about Meteor though. Will it be replacing the Lightning Strike completely? In other words: will it drop from D1 + D2 bosses, same damage, same aoe, same cooldown, be used by skeletal mages in D3 etc? If that is the case then I guess the new Lightning spell will be droppable in D4.

I also think it's very important to make all spells useful in different situations and there are many possible combinations which can do that like: low damage + large aoe, fast casttime + low damage, damage stacking up per consecutive hits and things like that. I really like your idea though, that it would deal more damage on monsters that have been hit with Water Globes. It makes sense that a water soaked enemy would take more damage from a lightning spell and it would also make the spell useful in certain situations.

For those who can't wait for the new version coming out ... please be a little patient. This is really much harder than I expected. I am so rusted in terms of jassing that I haven't even actually started working on the spell code yet. I'm still just reading all my script again and trying to understand what I did there once, to avoid unpleasant bugs.
*sigh* ... I just hope I can "relearn" all the stuff soon.

I think most of us are excited about the idea of a new version coming out, how could we not be? But I also think that we know that it will be a long time before it comes out. Personally I don't care how long it will take before a new version is out, I'm just happy with the idea that a new version will (most likely) be coming sometime in the future and I'm sure others feel the same way. Take your time to make the new version into a nice addition to a masterpiece!


There are a few other things I'd like to suggest and/or mention.

Some bugs:

Southwest of Gaspode and his army, below the docks, there is a small coast in which a squire type class can use shieldbash (shieldslam?) on someone in pvp-mode to push the character up to Andrazzar. This is usually done for stealing purposes as I understand.

I've also (rarely) encountered bugs which involve Fire boss and Andrazzar. In about 3 cases out of many, many runs in D3 the Andrazzar boss has gone invulnerable and resetted after someone died, a similar thing happened with the Fire boss once when someone died. The difference seemed to be that only the minions disappeared and the boss didn't completely reset because he didn't resummon the minions until the next summoning period.
I can't say for sure what caused this, but I'm guessing it has something to do with their minions that they spawn.
Again, this has only happened rarely as well.

I'm not neccessarily expecting you to fix all of the bugs. I'm only writing these to let you know of them so you can decide for yourself.


Other suggestions:
Add tooltips to spells to say how long cooldown there is on them, I'd especially like to request some way of seeing the cooldown on the usable Mind Breaker staff (the actual spell seems to be called Mind Twist?).

Increase the critical damage % for points into the "Strength" attribute. Right now it's (1.5 * str) / 500. With 50 stength points (which is an alright amount of strength) this would be: (1.5 * 50) / 500 = 0.15 meaning a 15 % increased crit damage. Personally I find this to be quite low.

I also don't think that the Sacrifice spell should consume rage, even if you add an explosion effect to it. Going by the current ideas posted, only the Monk and Necromancer has two spells which consume rage, while others only have one. I like the spell ideas overall though, including the monk's.

 

[Zwiebelchen]

Sounds great! I'm guessing the coup de grace won't be as powerful as the Bladefury hitting from behind in stealth? Otherwise it would reduce the Bladefury's significance quite a bit.

Well, as both spells are cooldown spells (or better: not spamable), nothing prevents you from using both of them. So I don't really think there has to be a lot of difference. And remember that coup de grace has a limitation: it requires the target to be in a "vulnerable" state, i.e. being stunned or (I thought about that and will add that) casting a spell. That way you can not use it in every possible situation (i.e. stun immune bosses that do not have spells with casting time).

I like these ideas a lot. I have questions about Meteor though. Will it be replacing the Lightning Strike completely? In other words: will it drop from D1 + D2 bosses, same damage, same aoe, same cooldown, be used by skeletal mages in D3 etc? If that is the case then I guess the new Lightning spell will be droppable in D4.

Yes, Meteor will completely replace the old lightning strike and will be dropped in D1 and D2. Also, people that already have lightning strike will get that spell replaced automaticly.

I also think it's very important to make all spells useful in different situations and there are many possible combinations which can do that like: low damage + large aoe, fast casttime + low damage, damage stacking up per consecutive hits and things like that. I really like your idea though, that it would deal more damage on monsters that have been hit with Water Globes. It makes sense that a water soaked enemy would take more damage from a lightning spell and it would also make the spell useful in certain situations.

This is part of the concept. The Sorcerer is an exception here, though. As enemies tend to have higher and higher special resistances in the upcoming content, people will have to gain some "knowledge" about what element is the best for damaging certain enemies. I want sorcerers to have an advantage over other spellcasting classes in that way, that they have a wider selection of spamable spells to always have a spell solution for every enemy.
However, all of the spamable spells will have a special flavour to them. Fireball with its small AoE, water globe with the slightly higher DPS and lightning charge (the upcoming spamable lightning spell) with its synergy to water globe and other frost/water spells.

I think most of us are excited about the idea of a new version coming out, how could we not be? But I also think that we know that it will be a long time before it comes out. Personally I don't care how long it will take before a new version is out, I'm just happy with the idea that a new version will (most likely) be coming sometime in the future and I'm sure others feel the same way. Take your time to make the new version into a nice addition to a masterpiece!

I think once I actually started coding, the progress will be faster than I imagine. After all I am creating spells - which was always the most fun part of mapping for me. I remember the day I created both the ranger and the thief class on one single day, complete with 5 spells each.
It's just that lazyness sometimes ... double clicking on the map editor icon on desktop really requires a lot of ... mental strength.

Southwest of Gaspode and his army, below the docks, there is a small coast in which a squire type class can use shieldbash (shieldslam?) on someone in pvp-mode to push the character up to Andrazzar. This is usually done for stealing purposes as I understand.

I think that is one of the things that - in my oppinion - is not really worth fixing. Its really weird to see what things people actually try out ... ... seriously, they should get a life.

I've also (rarely) encountered bugs which involve Fire boss and Andrazzar. In about 3 cases out of many, many runs in D3 the Andrazzar boss has gone invulnerable and resetted after someone died, a similar thing happened with the Fire boss once when someone died. The difference seemed to be that only the minions disappeared and the boss didn't completely reset because he didn't resummon the minions until the next summoning period.

Weird. Really. I mean, the minion and threat system script has not changed for any boss ever. So I really think there shouldn't be a problem with that. Otherwise I would have already seen it somewhere. Hmm ... but I have never tried those bosses myself, so I can't really tell.

Increase the critical damage % for points into the "Strength" attribute. Right now it's (1.5 * str) / 500. With 50 stength points (which is an alright amount of strength) this would be: (1.5 * 50) / 500 = 0.15 meaning a 15 % increased crit damage. Personally I find this to be quite low.

I agree on that. I will double that crit damage increase.

I also don't think that the Sacrifice spell should consume rage, even if you add an explosion effect to it. Going by the current ideas posted, only the Monk and Necromancer has two spells which consume rage, while others only have one. I like the spell ideas overall though, including the monk's.

I'll think about it ... but I can't really tell how this spell will turn out later. I haven't decided on any numbers yet.

 

[SmileyGhost]

Well, as both spells are cooldown spells (or better: not spamable), nothing prevents you from using both of them. So I don't really think there has to be a lot of difference. And remember that coup de grace has a limitation: it requires the target to be in a "vulnerable" state, i.e. being stunned or (I thought about that and will add that) casting a spell. That way you can not use it in every possible situation (i.e. stun immune bosses that do not have spells with casting time).

True, the coup de grace does have limitations and the Bladefury would never be useless since it's better than a regular "Attack". What I wanted to say was that if coup de grace does more than Bladefury when used in stealth from behind a target, after using a dazing trap then you'd probably just use coup de grace (if this is supposed to work in sleeping targets?) instead of Bladefury to deal more damage. I feel like Bladefury has added a nice assassin touch to the class because of its high damage when used in stealth from behind a target. I really like the coup de grace idea myself so I don't want it removed or anything like that, I just think that if it would deal more than Bladefury's stealth attack then the ability would lose its touch. I just looked up the Bladefury spell and seeing as it does 5 * attackpower in stealth from behind a target, I doubt the coup de grace would overpower it in that sense.

This is part of the concept. The Sorcerer is an exception here, though. As enemies tend to have higher and higher special resistances in the upcoming content, people will have to gain some "knowledge" about what element is the best for damaging certain enemies. I want sorcerers to have an advantage over other spellcasting classes in that way, that they have a wider selection of spamable spells to always have a spell solution for every enemy.
However, all of the spamable spells will have a special flavour to them. Fireball with its small AoE, water globe with the slightly higher DPS and lightning charge (the upcoming spamable lightning spell) with its synergy to water globe and other frost/water spells.

Indeed! This is one of the reasons why I love playing Sorcerer.

I think once I actually started coding, the progress will be faster than I imagine. After all I am creating spells - which was always the most fun part of mapping for me. I remember the day I created both the ranger and the thief class on one single day, complete with 5 spells each.
It's just that lazyness sometimes ... double clicking on the map editor icon on desktop really requires a lot of ... mental strength.

I know that feeling of reluctance myself when I have to start working on something big. You'll probably get a lot of work done when you put your mind to it, at least that is how it is with myself.

Weird. Really. I mean, the minion and threat system script has not changed for any boss ever. So I really think there shouldn't be a problem with that. Otherwise I would have already seen it somewhere. Hmm ... but I have never tried those bosses myself, so I can't really tell.

I don't know exactly what triggers it myself since I haven't seen it too many times. Could it be if only one person has threat on the minions and that person dies? Would the minions go after the closest target or could that possibly reset the boss perhaps?

It isn't that much of a problem though seeing as it only seems to occur very rarely.

I agree on that. I will double that crit damage increase.

In hindsight I saw that I wrote the formula wrong. I wrote it as: (1.5 * str) / 500. It is actually: 1.5 + (str / 500). This would mean that 50 str would give an additional 10 % crit damage. Just thought I should clairify that I wrote it wrong in my previous post.

 

[AnektoD]

We kill dung3 bosses, why mana cyrstal only one player? We want got all in dungeon players

 

[S0ulseeker]

We kill dung3 bosses, why mana cyrstal only one player? We want got all in dungeon players

Let me try and decode what you wrote there. So you are asking why only one mana crystal drops in d3 unstead of one for every player? Mana Crystals buy the best gear in the entire game and allowing the entire party to aquire one would make the game way too easy, thus only having one forces players to -roll for it and continue running the dungeon so everyone may get their gear ultimately adding to the replay factor of the map.

 

[Aegir]

Sounds great! I'm guessing the coup de grace won't be as powerful as the Bladefury hitting from behind in stealth? Otherwise it would reduce the Bladefury's significance quite a bit.

In my humble opinion coup de grace should be more powerful than Bladefury. How 5 very fast attack may cause grater damage than e.g. throat cut? Bladefury is used in fight, coup de grace idea base on attacking unconsious or immobilized enemy and aiming at vital points. You shouldn't compare sniper rifle to Gatling's machinegun. Bladefury is the best of assasins skill now and probably will be the best in new version. Coup de grace is finishing blow that needs preparations. By the way, usually the more advanced is skill, the more powerful it is. New skills shouldn't be less powerful than old ones.

About necromancer now. I thought about him for a while and i have idea. This idea based on my experience with ma favorite class necromancer, but sadly in many other games (Personally I don't play necromancer in Gaia, I don't know exactly why, but i think it's because he is weak in comparision to other necromancers whose i saw). The power of necromancy is not in quality but in quantity. At least in matter of minions. Necromancer itself is no match to warrior in combat skills and to offensive mage in firepower. Power of Necromancer resides in his servants. It's obvious that single minion (even very strong) is also no match for professional warrior or powerful mage. True necromancer power is large group of undeads (if possible different types and applications). So my idea is to simply increase mumber of necromancer minions (e.g. number=necromancerlevel/10 ) in addition to their strength boost what was proposed earlier. Consider also some synergies between skeletons. For example group of 3 skeletons might be more powerful than 3 individual skeletons simply added up. In this matter 1+1+1 should be equal to e.g. 4. The diversification of skeleton types in necros army with proper behavior, proper AI scripts for each of them may be a good way of implementing a substitute of tactics to them. Undeads usually are not very smart so it shouldn't be anything sophisticated.

You may also consider to add one skill to each of skeleton types. For example bash/shield slam to skeleton warrior and fire arrow to skeleton archer. Also skeleton warriors should generate more threat and be more durable and resistant.

Maybe all of this looks like exagerration and necromancer will be too much powerful, but all depends on level of other classes skills and difficulty level of Dungeon 4. Now necromancer is weak for most players. Personally I don't have one, so for me he is sorcerer with firestrike exchanged to supposedly weak minions. Maybe i should try to play necro?

 

[SmileyGhost]

In my humble opinion coup de grace should be more powerful than Bladefury. Bladefury is used in fight, coup de grace idea base on attacking unconsious or immobilized enemy and aiming at vital points. You shouldn't compare sniper rifle to Gatling's machinegun. Bladefury is the best of assasins skill now and probably will be the best in new version. Coup de grace is finishing blow that needs preparations. By the way, usually the more advanced is skill, the more powerful it is. New skills shouldn't be less powerful than old ones.

I'm not sure if I have emphasized this clearly enough so I'll try to make it as coherent and simple as possible this time. Bladefury does 2.5 * attackpower normally, but twice as much damage when used in stealth and hitting the enemy from behind. This means the damage adds up to 5.0 * attackpower when these conditions are met.
Bladefury's true strength lies in making use of this fact. This is the part that I didn't want to be rendered useless.

I do understand that unlike bladefury, the coup de grace can only be used under certain conditions so of course you want it to be powerful when those conditions are met. My opinions may seem conflicting, but I don't think it neccessarily has to mean that coup de grace has to be weaker than bladefury. For example, if coup de grace would do 4.0 * attackpower then it would be more powerful than a regular bladefury, but weaker than a behind stealth bladefury. I'm not saying it should or has to be implemented like this, I'm just trying to say that there are ways to keep the same usefulness to bladefury while making coup de grace a nice addition to the assassin class.

How 5 very fast attack may cause grater damage than e.g. throat cut?

I think that you are taking a way too logical approach when saying this. Normally I'd agree, but pretty much every RPG is unrealistic in this sense. How come my upcoming meteor spell can deal way less damage than a simple wack with my staff on an enemy's head only because I wasn't angry enough (rage) when I cast my spell? These games are unlogical like that and there is no escaping it.


To me, the most important part of getting new skills isn't that they are more powerful than the previous ones. It's that they are useful and adds something to the character to make it better overall.

 

[S0ulseeker]

To me, the most important part of getting new skills isn't that they are more powerful than the previous ones. It's that they are useful and adds something to the character to make it better overall.

/agree
+1

 

[cooI_Ilama]

Just back to some balancing issues .
Currently most would agree (I think) the bosses in d3, I believe have armour values sufficiently high to place the berserker/assassin/ranger at a sure disadvantage compared to the magician class in terms of dps.
Especially ranger since she has no - armour debuff such as embrittling acid nor high natural armour penetration via high strength such as the berserker.

Zwieb you mentioned the upcoming bosses will have certain higher resistances,
but hopefully you will set it as such that at certain bosses, their resistances are generally very high rendering the magician less effective than physical dps, and other bosses will have higher armour values, so the reverse holds true.
This would encourage parties at d3 to have a wider variety of dps, since most still agree magician is by far the prefered choice.

 

[Aegir]

I agree with you SmileyGhost, but for me the more game is realistic the better it is. Until now Gaia is very realistic in comparision to many other games and i think it should remain like this. In most cases coup de grace should provide high probability to kill (it' doesn't metter if it's very high damage, damage equal to % of Max Hit Points, % chance to kill or certain death in special circumstances). But all depends on Zwiebelchen conception. For now most of his ideas were great or good.

 

[AnektoD]

I love Gaias. Eurobattle.net in server, my friends and I usually play this on the map. We were happy to have you continue your map. We look forward to the new version.

Edit: I want one guestion; gaias v1.1e save/load codes in v1.2 work ?

 

[_lycan]

Awesome

 

[SmileyGhost]

Edit: I want one guestion; gaias v1.1e save/load codes in v1.2 work ?

Read:

if i play new version map, my saved codes of 1.1e can be used ?

Read:

For all those worried about possible future code wipes: At the current state, it will be unlikely. There are still enough "slots" for 2 new spells and a lot of new items left in the current code. Also I still have some quest slots left, so I don't think there will be a codewipe. However, I can not guarantee it by 100%. Just like ... 95% or so.

 

[AnektoD]

Sparkling Urn drop from Lord Ardnazzar? we Kill my team 5-6 times not drop

 

[SmileyGhost]

Sparkling Urn drop from Lord Ardnazzar? we Kill my team 5-6 times not drop

Read:
http://www.hiveworkshop.com/forums/guides-database-650/complete-d3-droplist-166648/
You really should look around a bit before asking.

Of course the Sparkling Urn is (somewhat) rare, it wouldn't be fun if no one needed the Urn and it kept dropping instead of other items.

You may also want to read http://www.hiveworkshop.com/forums/gaias-retaliation-orpg-649/sparkling-urn-182188/.

It would probably be better if you make a new thread for asking these type of things. The code swipe question fits into this thread (although, already answered), but this question about the Sparkling Urn does not.

 

[AnektoD]

Maybe this staff item icon:

change to :

 

[_lycan]

Well i have only played till first class level 17-18 i dont remember i dont really have friends who help me level up i have leveled up with only 1 friend whos right now level 18 (squire) and im (ranger).

 

[InfernalTater]

Well i have only played till first class level 17-18 i dont remember i dont really have friends who help me level up i have leveled up with only 1 friend whos right now level 18 (squire) and im (ranger).

I didn't really see any suggestions in your post above. It's nice that you and your friend are playing the game, but I suggest you continue to play further until you've gained all of your abilities. Then, tell everyone your ideas on improvements for 1.2!

 

[Ski_pie]

So hows the construction going on the game there guys? If u dont mind my asking.

 

[Zwiebelchen]

Nothing special happened. Still on the "try out some stuff" phase. And to be honest, the weather is good ... summer incoming and all ... :/
I said this will take long and I was serious about it. Sorry, I know you guys want this to come out very fast, but this is not going to happen.

 

[PastTime]

Im not the one who craves for release, I think I could help you with suggestions, can't really do anything with JASS except for copying and making something new on the sames rules. However I think most of players should be patient since most of us were assured that you won't continue making this map.

So best luck and have fun while making this, I hope you are doing it to please yourself and gain satisfaction also.

Cheers.

 

[SmileyGhost]

A few bugs/exploits...

[Edited/Removed]

Lord Andrazzar's minions are still alive and attacking after killing the boss. Don't know if it is intentional or not, but seems unnecessary if it's intentional since you can just run away from them until they reset or, of course, spend time to kill them.

The Seal of Flames crystal that is used to summon the Blazing Flame boss is permanently gone for the rest of the game after summoning. In other words, even if you reset the dungeon you can't re-summon the boss since The Seal of Flames has disappeared. It makes no difference if you just summon the boss and reset the dungeon or if you kill the boss and reset the dungeon. This also means that you can only kill the Blazing Flame once per game.

There is also another strange bug that has occured about 3 times to our crusader tank when we have killed/tried to kill the Blazing Flame. The minions has done 17k+ damage on occasion. I've only got his word on the actual damage, but all I can say is that at least two of the times this bug happened the minions hit through his full health + shield in an instant even though he has 75 % fire resistance in total. This seems to confirm the huge amount of damage that he received.
I/We haven't encountered this when killing the Blazing Flame the last few days however and unfortunetly I do not know what causes it.

Another bug (a smaller bug) concerning the Blazing Flame is that you can engage the boss, get him to summon his minions and reset the boss. By doing that the boss won't be able to summon his minions for quite a while.


Other than that I just have to say the following:
Enjoy summer and take your time on this project!

 

[Zwiebelchen]

A few bugs/exploits...

The pictures attached shows two locations where you can block the Lady boss in D3. This enables the vampire-marked to escape being hit by her. The quality on the pictures aren't the best because I had to resize them, but they should be good enough to spot the places.

I cant fix all those places. I dont see a problem with that either. But thanks for showing everyone -_-'

Lord Andrazzar's minions are still alive and attacking after killing the boss. Don't know if it is intentional or not, but seems unnecessary if it's intentional since you can just run away from them until they reset or, of course, spend time to kill them.

This, however, is a bug indeed. Well, as its not gamebreaking, I think this is fine.

The Seal of Flames crystal that is used to summon the Blazing Flame boss is permanently gone for the rest of the game after summoning. In other words, even if you reset the dungeon you can't re-summon the boss since The Seal of Flames has disappeared. It makes no difference if you just summon the boss and reset the dungeon or if you kill the boss and reset the dungeon. This also means that you can only kill the Blazing Flame once per game.

Weird, I thought the thing respawns when you reset.

There is also another strange bug that has occured about 3 times to our crusader tank when we have killed/tried to kill the Blazing Flame. The minions has done 17k+ damage on occasion. I've only got his word on the actual damage, but all I can say is that at least two of the times this bug happened the minions hit through his full health + shield in an instant even though he has 75 % fire resistance in total. This seems to confirm the huge amount of damage that he received.
I/We haven't encountered this when killing the Blazing Flame the last few days however and unfortunetly I do not know what causes it.

Sounds to me like it is working as intended. I dont quite remember which abilities I gave to the minions, but I'm pretty sure I added something like that.
Dunno why; but I think I had my reasons. Maybe I wanted to players to kite the minions.

Another bug (a smaller bug) concerning the Blazing Flame is that you can engage the boss, get him to summon his minions and reset the boss. By doing that the boss won't be able to summon his minions for quite a while.

Nothing gamebreaking either.

Other than that I just have to say the following:
Enjoy summer and take your time on this project!

Thx, you too.

 

[AnektoD]

And Item types : Cloth"l", Amulet"t" Leather"l" looks very bad, please fix: D

 

[SmileyGhost]

I cant fix all those places. I dont see a problem with that either. But thanks for showing everyone -_-'

It wasn't my intention to show everyone these places so they could (ab)use them. I'll just edit my post and remove the attached files.

Weird, I thought the thing respawns when you reset.

All I can say is that it has never respawned anytime I've checked. Although I understand that you won't fix most of the bugs that do not affect gameplay as much. I'd personally like it if you would take the time to fix this one.
It would be nice to get this confirmed by others as well, but I've checked about 3-4 times with 100 % accuracy so far. The group I play with at the moment no longer bothers to check if it's there or not. We simply remake a new game if we have summoned him and need to reset the dungeon.

Sounds to me like it is working as intended. I dont quite remember which abilities I gave to the minions, but I'm pretty sure I added something like that.
Dunno why; but I think I had my reasons. Maybe I wanted to players to kite the minions.

I see. It seems strange that it has only occured a couple of times when we've been killing him, but I guess we haven't accidentally triggered the minions' skill recently.
Kiting the minions would be hard since they have a ranged attack. I'm not sure if other crowd control works, but I doubt they do since the magician's Frost Cage spell says that the minions are "bosses" and therefore cannot be frozen. There is probably another reason for the implemented skill of theirs.


-Edit-
For future reference... Do you want me to keep posting less serious bugs so you'll know about them or want me to just post the ones I think are more serious?

-Edit2-
About this bug:

I've also (rarely) encountered bugs which involve Fire boss and Andrazzar. In about 3 cases out of many, many runs in D3 the Andrazzar boss has gone invulnerable and resetted after someone died, a similar thing happened with the Fire boss once when someone died. The difference seemed to be that only the minions disappeared and the boss didn't completely reset because he didn't resummon the minions until the next summoning period.
I can't say for sure what caused this, but I'm guessing it has something to do with their minions that they spawn.
Again, this has only happened rarely as well.

Weird. Really. I mean, the minion and threat system script has not changed for any boss ever. So I really think there shouldn't be a problem with that. Otherwise I would have already seen it somewhere. Hmm ... but I have never tried those bosses myself, so I can't really tell.

I don't know exactly what triggers it myself since I haven't seen it too many times. Could it be if only one person has threat on the minions and that person dies? Would the minions go after the closest target or could that possibly reset the boss perhaps?

It isn't that much of a problem though seeing as it only seems to occur very rarely.

It seems like it really does happen when someone has all of the threat from the minions and dies. I've seen it a few times more now and it's especially easy to spot/trigger it with the Blazing Flame boss. When someone stands close to the boss when he summons and that person dies from the minions' attacks before anyone has a chance to hit the minions, the boss will reset and gain full health. Someone else should have encountered this and be able to confirm that this is what triggers it.
This problem has only occured with bosses that summons minions, Lord Andrazzar and Blazing Flame with other words.

A small bug I forgot to mention... Abilities like Steel Body and Heroic Presence are deactivated after the D2 boss cinematic.

Unrelated to the rest of the stuff I've mentioned is that the Fire Shield spell doesn't have a hotkey.

I'm sure that I've forgotten to mention some things, but it'll probably come back to me at some point.

-Edit3-
When you try to dispell the Incinerate spell it keeps reappearing until the time runs out. At least if you try to dispell it on the person who got it first.

-Edit4-
Rage is refilled even when attacked by allies.

 

[AnektoD]

Unrelated to the rest of the stuff I've mentioned is that the Fire Shield spell doesn't have a hotkey.

Cleric Resurrection too.